There was a password problem. Therefore here the news from the boat in one go. Pictures will come later.
Dad Day 1 Racing:
Position outside of Subic Bay. Went out for sail practice getting us prepared for a 17:00 race start. But for organizational reasons this has been postponed to 29:00 local or noon in Europe. My watch, Birdwatcher is currently off watch taking a rest and prepping meals. Guys I love sailing. But this today was almost a torture. Light breeze like 8 to 12 now, brutal sun and 35 degrees. Grinding a main up brings you almost to dehydration. And we need sun cream, sun cream, sun cream. That’s for now.
Dad heute um 16 Uhr: Quick update. Took the watch from 6pm to 10pm and will have the watch 2am till 6 am. What a brilliant watch. Gorgeous so meet. 15knots of Wind from NNE and low seastate. Still on a fine reach with Yankee, Stay and main. We now have 56 Neto the gate of he finish line. Pushing the boat hard. Every 10 minutes trim check. It is still 27 gehrend out there and we are sailing, no, storming through a pitch black night at the horizon and stars above. I helmed for an hour. Let’s de is good. Sleep now!
Dad:
In the Second Sprint
We are currently 200 nm West of Lucon island. At is night and the sky is currently moonless and full of stars. Amazing sky. We had a „great“ start of the day with 12 knots of wind and a battle for first, second and third place. You might have seen on the tracker how that ended. Was a bit nerve wrecking. Later the day the wind died on us and we were bouncing around in a dead and plain see. The sun was glowing. The crew is in a good mood although I saw it this morning. The little green monster came jumping over several 3 meter waves. It sneaked down the companion way, grabbed two guys by the throat and shook them around until they turned green. Everybody can imagine what followed. These poor guys turned green and gave it to the fishes. One recovered already but the other one still makes the boat lighter. We have 53 minutes to our watch. And at 2 am we will back. The boat is bouncing around, still shaking in a Dead Sea. Hopefully the day tomorrow will bring some wind.
10.03. um 20 Uhr
I just came on watch at 2 am local time this morning. The weather is really nice. The air is warm like 25 degrees. We are on a closed haul to our first Mark after we commenced the first ever Le Mans Start at night in the Clipper history during my last watch. The wind is light. We are flying main, stay and Yankee 1. Windward is Qingdao that we are battling it. Leeward is Halong Bay and Punta. The boat is going well. Downstairs it is hot, hot, hot. Had an hour of sleep. My next duty is mother.
11.03. um 09.30 Uhr
I was on watch from 2am this n but as I could not sleep I went up half an hour early. It was so hot out n my bunk. I slept for an hour. We sailed the whole night under white sails course 270 when Punta pushed from below. I was helming at that time but we dug and gave up windward position for the sake of the shortest course. 04:30 I went down to start breakfast, boiled eggs, pancakes, serials. Once the the galley was clean at 7 am I wrote the crew blog for the boat. But I am not sure if that will be broadcasted. I took a little break below deck and dozed away in the saloon for half hour. After that i prepared lunch – burger bar with Angus beef burger patties and a selection of toppings. Obviously cheese, fresh onions, cucumber salted and spiced as also Sauerkraut for the Lederhosenburger. Galley was pretty messy and from my watch I had no clew if the dish was OK. There is a bit of the weird atmosphere. Anyway. After they went upstairs the other watch was fed. And since they were worked up it seem to be appreciated. Not for long and I will be back at the stove for veggi rice with curry. We will see. We will go back to our second night and I will have a day without special duties.
The sailing itself is amazing. We would say Kaiserwetter in Kiel, 16 knots of wind, puffy clouds und bright blue water But it is hot. 28.4C water temperature and like 32c air temp. In the sun it is brutal. We are flying Code 2 kite and all boats in the fleet are visible. Qingdao and Sanya had a very nice battle fighting for windward position as I came on deck. Punta leads. Nice job sneaking away from us. Currently we hold course 272 direct to the mark for us.
Could become a fairly short race if the wind stays like that. Hope you at home are all good.
13.03. um 13.30 Uhr
The last 24 hours were difficult. Yesterday Ordnung great sailing and as reported the wind died. The first night shift logged 2 nm in 4 hours. No wind. We started our watch and there was no wind either. Close to midnight we felt a touch of wind on our sweaty faces. Yes. Windseeker went up. It took us less than 5 minutes. We started to move again. 4.6 knots wind 2.3 knots of speed. Yes. after 8 hours dead locked we were moving away from Halong and Dare to Lead. They pulled their Seekers but we were faster. Wind increased to 7 knots. Decision was taken to pull Code 1. And as you must drop the Seeker first we lost speed giving Dare to Lead and Halong the chance to pass by. Jesus! We continued due North and Halong went way East. We passed what we got to the next watch. Four hours later no wind. Halong stayed with the Seeker and used the apparent wind to its advantage. Next morning was payday for them. East was best. Wind veered to the Northeast and easterly boats had a great angle to the gate. We were West. Not the best. But we are fighting. Today great sailing under white sails. Perfect trim, very good speed and good pointing angle. I was allowed to helm from 16:00 local till 17:10 and took the opportunity to wrestle Zhuhai down. I love helming upwind boat to boat. It is not about technique l. It is a mind game. We entered this evening the third Ocean sprint. We battle on here and now. On our last 260 miles to Subic. We are all wet sweat everywhere. And I look like Rasterman with sticky hair in all direction. But I can tell you baby wipes are not too bad as shower replacement. Need to go to sleep. 1 hour 44 minutes left. Slept a total of four hours since we departed. Joerg from CV23 Black Betty in the South China Sea.
Heute Morgen um 07.00 Uhr
we passed the gate for our last 262 nm Ocean sprint last night under white sails close hauled. It was actually fun sailing. But when we came to watch and 10pm local
The wind died to about 4 knots true. First thing was to drop the Stay. Not enough. When the Yankee became the shape of a wet towel we decided for the negligee, the Windseeker, semi transparent and living up in the slightest touch of wind. We crawled along and did not want to believe it hat we again tried sailing on a mirrored sea. But we first awarded by an amazing night sky. Around midnight the red half moon glared over the horizon turning the sea into a bronze silk liner. We peacefully glided across the waters. And although this was a great view we were all desperately hoping for wind, not a breeze. We had enough of the banging noise of the rigg. Where is the action. After a restless night I went for breakfast. I noticed that my dark blue shorts started to turn white. No not sea water, I am priced by salt myself. Dried sweat turned inside out. Hey but what can you do when you sweat like a pig for four days 24 hours. I only have one pair of shorts and only one long sleeve UV protection shirt (which I decided not to wear in bed any more. I use a T-shirt in case I go to bed). Anyway in the galley I got two slices of toast with Marmelade (Orange!) and a mug of horrible coffee. But this shook me up since I had a net to f 4 hours sleep since we left. I was watch leader today. I stepped into the dark cockpit “morning guys” was repeated by grumbling “mornin”. Yes these guys sat there since 2 am. But hurray, the kite was up, we were heeling 45 degrees. Amazing. Kaz transferred the watch and I took the helm. Instruction was easy. Do 60 true wind angle until you passed the crossing LOG tanker. Than bring it up to 50degrees. So I did. The bottom of the kite touched the water at 50degress by about 10%. The helming instruction could have been much more simple. Drive the boat with a skimming kite and you will be alright. Tellyho. 10.6 knots and a race de on a razor blade. This was sailing. The sun came up and welcomed our effort. A glittering sea, fairly calm sea state, true wind 5.8 knots, apparent wind 7.8 knots and we were doing 10.6 knots with 220nm In front of us. Blooded hell. I love sailing. I love this type of sailing pushing a 46 ton battle tank through the water. Joy and happiness and big smiles. I called Steve onto the helm. A newbie. Let him dance on the razor blade. It took some coaching but after a while he did well. Apparently our wind angle was not sufficient for the gate. We hoisted the Yankee, dropped the kite, hoisted the stay and puffed up by 30 degrees. Hard work but spoiled down like clockwork. Rock n Roll. I love good maneuvers when sailing. Wow, this day is my day. But I asked myself why it was already so hot at 08:30 until I realized that I still had my BR1 jacket on. Free sauna, no charge. This is what I needed. I was soaking wet, I mean sweat dripped out of my arms. I needed a dry up. So downstairs (remember no change cause I only have 1 shirt), off the life jacket, off the jacket on the life jacket and out to the cockpit. I crawled up to the fence and did the Titanic Kate Winslet dryness Nbg Action into the wind. Spreader arms and 5 minutes later the shirt was “sweat dry”, good for another few day I’d say. We continued with 10.6 knots on a fine reach. We continued to enjoy ourselves. Sailing almost at its best. Why almost? Because we had almost everything for good sailing. Good company, motivated crew, professional skipper and AQP, sunny sky, warm, warm water, 200nm run ahead with good forecast. But….there is no beer. That fine ice could beer is still 230nm miles out. We will get there, I am sure. Today is one of these days where I feel that I two lives. Birgit is one and I am missing her already. Sailing is the other one. After such a day the world could not be better. Skimming kite at 10.6 knots. I love sailing. Joerg, South China Sea.
Joe Sails 